The Nayarit State Attorney General’s Office confirmed the recovery of 20 hectares of high-value commercial land in the Nuevo Vallarta waterfront development in Bahía de Banderas, as part of the Megaoperation Nuevo Nayarit. This action followed the abandonment of the properties by shell companies, businesspeople, politicians, and alleged members of organized crime cells in the face of prosecution.
Attorney General Ludmila Heredia Verdugo explained that the land has an estimated value of between three and five billion pesos, with a price per square meter ranging from 15,000 to 25,000 pesos. She specified that the land is located in one of the most exclusive areas of the municipality, along the Cocoteros Avenue corridor and bordering the El Chino Estuary, across from the Marival Hotel.
According to the Prosecutor’s Office, the seizures were carried out on Friday, January 16, after the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office initiated legal proceedings to declare the properties abandoned. The possessors failed to appear despite having been legally notified, and the properties were subsequently transferred to the State Government.
“What happened? In January, the Prosecutor’s Office notified the owning companies of the Trust to which the properties had been contributed. It’s important to note that in many cases, the properties remain the property of the victims because there was never a public deed of sale; there were only notarized private contracts. In other words, they went to a notary and stated, ‘Yes, this is my signature,’ which only provides them with a specific date for the contract, but not the actual transfer of ownership.”
Heredia Verdugo explained that the transactions took place in 2016 under the Bahía de Banderas Trust (FIBBA) scheme, whose purpose is tourism development through Integrated Planned Centers. However, the land was supposed to be developed and built upon within a maximum of two years, in addition to complying with maintenance fees—obligations that went unmet for almost a decade.
The prosecutor revealed that the owners had accumulated exorbitant debts for maintenance and penalties for non-construction.
“They already owed the State more than 1 billion pesos in penalties for non-construction and maintenance, exceeding the value of the fraudulent sales themselves.”
Given these facts, and the presumption that the FIBBA properties were acquired fraudulently, politicians, high-net-worth businesspeople, and even alleged criminals, who presented themselves as owners and legal representatives of the companies, have outstanding arrest warrants.
The prosecutor indicated that the defendants were duly notified of the corresponding hearing and had two legal options: appear to defend their assets, risking arrest based on existing warrants, or challenge the proceedings through appeals for protection (amparo). They chose not to appear.
Finally, Ludmila Heredia Verdugo defended the legality of the proceedings, asserting that it is a “clean process with a federal counterpart that validates the legality of the State’s actions,” referring to the Attorney General’s Office (FGR), and dismissed any suggestion of political persecution or illegal seizure of properties.
Source: tribunadelabahia
